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Which ones were the BEST?
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[QUOTE]Originally posted by Doodlebug: [QB] Please allow me, a long-time lurker, to join your discussion about the best passenger trains, in particular the debate between the Seaboard’s [i]Silver Meteor[/i] and the Atlantic Coast Line’s [i]Champion.[/i] My vote for the [i]Meteor[/i] is biased. I was born and raised in Hamlet, N.C., self-proclaimed “Hub of the Seaboard,” where the railroad’s north-south and east-west mainlines crossed; I rode only Seaboard trains until the SAL-ACL merger in 1967; and, with the exception of my father, the male ancestors on both sides of my family worked for the Seaboard, several of them as passenger conductors on the [i]Silver Meteor, Silver Star[/i] and [i]Silver Comet.[/i] From the late 1930s until the merger of the two railroads, the [i]Silver Meteor[/i] and the [i]Champion[/i] were regarded as the flagships of two passenger train fleets that competed fiercely in one of the most hotly contested and successful rail passenger markets in America: picking up frozen passengers in the Northeast and dropping them off the next day – defrosted – at their Florida vacation destinations. It was a competition in which the Coast Line held a competitive advantage because its route was the more easterly of the railroads’ parallel paths between Richmond, Va., and Jacksonville, Fla. Down the flat coastal plain, the Coast Line built a straight, double-track railroad. Linking the capital cities of Virginia and the Carolinas, which were on the edge of the hilly Piedmont, the Seaboard had a curvy, single track line. The Seaboard’s passenger service survived and eventually took the lead because of its innovative firsts in the market, such as the addition of air conditioning and then diesels to its [i]Orange Blossom Special,[/i] the winter-only all-Pullman train immortalized in a Johnny Cash ballad, which competed against the Coast Line’s [i]Florida Special,[/i] also a seasonal all-Pullman operation. But the most important innovation in the market was the introduction of lightweight streamlined trains. The Seaboard, as usual, was first, inaugurating the all-coach [i]Silver Meteor[/i] on Feb. 2, 1939. More than 75,000 entries were received in the Seaboard’s name-the-train contest; 30 winners divided the $500 first prize. The railroad’s passenger revenue increased by a third in the [i]Meteor’s[/i] first six months of operation, and within a year its consist was doubled from seven to 14 cars. The Coast Line, which had originally argued that a streamlined train could not succeed in the New York-Florida market, immediately reversed course when the [i]Meteor’s[/i] success became apparent and introduced the lightweight all-coach [i]Champion,[/i] named for its then-vice president Champion McDowell Davis, on Dec. 1, 1939. (Imagine today if Amtrak could decide on a major change in passenger service, order and receive new equipment all in less than a year.) Both trains increased passenger demand. One early Seaboard customer survey found that 40% of the [i]Meteor’s[/i] passengers would not have traveled by rail to Florida on another train. Competition for the growing market – with Seaboard usually taking the first step – meant the addition of second diners, heavyweight sleepers (switching to lightweight sleepers once war-imposed manufacturing restrictions were dropped in the 1940s) and additional sections. The Seaboard’s second streamliner was called the [i]Advance Silver Meteor,[/i] which evolved into the [i]Silver Star,[/i] while the Coast Line ran separate [i]East Coast[/i] and [i]West Coast Champions[/i] to Florida’s Gulf and Atlantic Coasts. The railroads also added nurses to their service crews and gimmicks such as fashion shows in their lounge cars to entertain passengers. Others who rode both trains can comment on whatever subjective service differences – better food, prettier china, etc. – existed in the two railroads’ copycat passenger operations. But the high point in equipment development came with the addition of the Sun Lounge car to the [i]Silver Meteor[/i] in 1956. The lounge end of these cars, which also had five double-bedrooms, featured extra-large windows along the sides and windows built into the roof. The genius of this design, on a route where Northeast tunnel clearances were too low for dome cars, was that a first-class passenger could step from an icy station platform into a warm, sun-filled room with driftwood lamps, Florida beach murals and order a drink 24 hours before arrival in the tropics. According to Joseph M. Welsh’s excellent history of the SAL-ACL passenger competition, “By Streamliner New York to Florida,” for which I’m indebted for much of the data here, the Coast Line’s annual passenger revenue, which was one-third greater than Seaboard’s $21 million in 1946, trailed Seaboard $14.8 million to $14.4 million twenty years later on the eve of Amtrak. It was the [i]Silver Meteor[/i] that carried its round-end observation car until Amtrak. Today the [i]Champion[/i] name is gone, but the [i]Silver Meteor[/i] runs the [i]Champion's[/i] route on what are now CSX rails. Most of the Seaboard’s rails between Richmond and Raleigh, N.C., were removed, but the [i]Silver Star[/i] still covers as much of the old Seaboard, also now CSX, as possible including passage through my home town. If work by the states of Virginia and North Carolina comes to full fruition, the old link between Richmond and Raleigh will be restored and most passenger service, either by Amtrak or a successor operator, will move to the Seaboard route, returning the [i]Silver Meteor[/i] to what is, in my mind, its rightful place. My personal bias aside, neither of these trains would have been what they became were it not for the competition between them in a unique market, and the competition would not have been as fierce if the Seaboard had not been forced into innovation by its underdog status. [/QB][/QUOTE]
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